“I am not seeking to leave the MTA. I was approached by the Metropolitan Airports Authority. They sought me out. So, it’s never been the case in any of these cases of me actually seeking a job,” said Ford, who we caught while he was attending the Chinatown Community Development Center’s Lunar New Year luncheon today.

He went on: “I have a national reputation and from time to time people seek me out for positions and it’s been pretty much consistent that I’ve turned them down for the most part. However, this is one that did get my interest.”

Ford, in his first public comments about the possible new gig, said he needed to do what was in the best interests of his career and his family. “From a career standpoint and from a personal standpoint, this was something that was worth my attention.”

Meantime, Board of Supervisors President David Chiu, who was also at the CCDC event, said he is very concerned about the situation.

“Many of us are concerned about the long-term and short-term management of the MTA and if he is interviewing in lots of places we hope that gets resolved quickly because we need someone at the helm who will be focused on the huge challenges facing the MTA right now.”

According to reports, MWAA officials are expected to make a decision by next week.

Nat Ford is facing the same criticism that Gavin did when he ran for governor. Newsom said he didn’t need to be in City Hall to effectively manage the city. Apparently Ford didn’t need to ride MUNI to do his job either.

Richard Mlynarik

It’s a seller’s market for non-old-white-guy “public” servants who will unquestioningly and uniformly put the interests of contractor mafioso (Central Subway = PB, Clipper(SM) = Cubic, etc) ahead of that of their readily duped constituents.

Making the Dulles rail mafioso wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice is a perfectly logical career progression, one it would be foolish not to take.

For an old-white-guy example, just look at Michael Burns, who took a truly cushy lateral move from a full time job making PB and pals $2 billion richer at public expense via the Central Subway to making PB and pals $10 billion or more richer via BART to Santa Clara and HSR to Los Banos. Not only that but he, like Ford, lost the distraction of having to deal with transit riders — a marginal force in SF, but an utterly negligible target of outright contempt in gorgeous Santa Clara County. Who needs the hassle of answering to the capricious SF Board of Supervisors when you could instead answer to a uniformly and hand-picked parade of the dimmest and most piant possible rubber-stamping officials at VTA?